Thin copper foils, having a thickness of 0.003 inches or less, free of pinholes, and having a purity of greater than 99 percent are required for printed circuit applications. In addition to meet military specifications many of these foils are required to maintain a surface characteristic of 0.17 micro inches. Foils for this purpose are generally produced in an electrolytic process in which copper from a copper anode or copper containing electrolyte is plated into a rotating drum serving as a cathode and the foil is peeled off the drum as it rotates. In the production of such foils various drum materials have been employed in the prior art. These include stainless steel, chromium, titanium and rhenium. It has proven very difficult to produce pinhole free foils at small thicknesses employing the stainless steel, chromium or titanium drums. As described in U.S. Pat. No. 3,677,906, substantially pinhole free thin foil has been successfully produced utilizing a drum having a rhenium surface. There remain, however, some problems associated with even the rhenium surface drum. One such problem is the deterioration of the drum surface with time and the roughened drum surface results in a roughened foil surface. A second problem is the relatively high expense associated with the preparation and maintenance of the rhenium drum.